Information: Everything an Attendee Needs to Know

Forms

Just like every other hackathon, we're trying our best not to get sued by our venue, sponsors, or get caught up in any other wacky hijinks. Fine, there's going to be hijinks, but those are on our own terms. All comedy aside, if that horrible joke could be considered comedy, there's a couple forms that anyone accepted to ProHacks is going to have to sign. First off is a waiver of liability. That waiver basically shifts the blame off of us in case some sort of accident happens. We know that it's not ideal, but this way you guys can have fun and we can rest easy that we won't get arrested. Aside from that form, there will be another form that is a media release form. This form grants us permission to record and capture media of you, then plaster it all over our website so that we seem 'authentic'. Please note that we will not be allowing anybody who does not fill out these forms to enter ProHacks. There will be no exceptions, so I suggest that you keep your form handy, but we will have some spares at check-in in case you forget. Trust us, it happens a lot. Either way, these forms will magically appear in your inbox once you (hopefully) receive your acceptance email.

FAQ

Who can participate?

Anyone that is enrolled in any level of study between middle school and college is welcome to apply to ProHacks! If you are in high school or above, you are also eligible to become a mentor!

Is this free?

Does root beer taste amazing? ProHacks is completely free for anybody who wants to attend. Don't worry about financial contribution! All we want from you is you hacking ability to be at its finest, and you to produce the best product you can.

What should I bring?

Regardless of what you plan on doing, we need you to bring any form of ID issued by some sort of infrastructure. That would mean your school ID, driver's license, or if you're feeling a little stupid bring your passport. For those of you that currently don't have any of that at your disposal, we assume that you are not currently enrolled in college, so a screenshot of your District's student portal, like InfiniteCampus for example, that shows your name and a picture of you should be enough. With that out of the way, we generally recommend bringing a laptop, its charger, earbuds, and a jacket. You need the laptop and its charger for obvious reasons, but it can get loud at hackathons! To help concentrate, we suggest bringing earbuds of some sort. It can also get cold, hence the jacket. For optional items, bring whatever tech you think can help you be more productive when hacking! In addition to that, if you plan on sleeping overnight, we will have a separate area set up for that. To properly take advantage of this, it would be wise to bring a sleeping bag and some toiletries so that your breath doesn't smell like garbage in the morning. There are restrictions on what you can bring/wear stated by our venue, so if you feel that you item is a bit of a risk, fill out the form below with an inquiry, or email [email protected] so that we aren't on the hook when the event rolls around!

Is there a Code of Conduct?

Yep. Sorry man, Johny can't bring the keg... Either way, although we don't have our own official form for a Code of Conduct as of now, expect to adhere to the guidelines in the MLH code of conduct.

I don't know how to code! What do I do?

Calm down! A lot of people go into hackathons without knowing how to code, and come out with quite a bit of knowledge! When it comes to coding, it's always better to learn hands on. If you have the time, I suggest going to Codecademy for some beginner oriented courses regarding a variety of coding fields, that range from web development to back-end development. In those courses, I consider git and python to be the must-haves, as they have a multitude of uses. For example, I wrote the bot in our discord completely with python! If you want, you can come into the hackathon blind, but it will be considerably harder for you to learn in a shorter period of time, but you can probably still get by! The organizers/mentors will be making rounds throughout the course of the hackathon, and we can offer help if you need it. Even if you can't find a mentor or organizer to help you, your issue can probably be found on stack overflow, or just ask other attendees! With that said, please keep in mind that ProHacks was designed as a competitive environment. Because of that, we are not offering beginner-oriented workshops, such as intro to web development, intro to python, etc. For many hackathons,many attendees complain that the beginner workshops take up space that could've been used by teams to code and just have more space in general. Either way, no matter how experienced you are at coding, we encourage you to come to ProHacks. Plus, we have a special prize for the best beginner hack!

Can I get travel reimbursement?

Unfortunately, we are not offering travel reimbursement at ProHacks this year. Hopefully we can implement that in ProHacks II!

I have food allergies! I'm vegetarian! I hate a certain food! I have other dietary restrictions that I don't want to talk about!

Don't worry, we got you covered! If you have food limitations of any sort, inform us of that when you are submitting the application. Based on that, we can either order a special variant of the meal that does not interfere with your limitations, or we can provide an alternative for you.

You didn't answer my question...

No problemo! Just fill out the form below or shot an email over to [email protected], and we can get back to you with an answer!